Photography was about to make its appearance on the world’s stage, although it did not yet bear the name of photography. Perhaps the quickest to appreciate it was a certain Joseph Hamel. He methodically gathered together the main examples of work and the documents that enable us today to understand the origins of the invention of photography…

This remarkable explorer would probably have been described as a pirate in the previous century or as an industrial spy in the following one. He came from the ends of the earth, and this is the tale of his strange adventure.

The Copernican Revolution was the paradigm shift from the Ptolemaic model of the heavens, formulated by Nicolaus Copernic some time before 1514 and refined until the publishing of De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium in 1543. Fifteen scores later, the Daguerreian Revolution was the paradigm shift from the classical representation of Nature and Human faces, formulated by Niépce some time before 1827 and refined by several gentlemen until the public announcement of 19 August 1839.

When the first photographic processes were invented and developped by Niépce and his followers in Europe, the photographic portrait was really born in America circa 1840. Robert Cornelius in Philadelphia and John Draper are the central figures.

Late May-Early June 1848. The Gray creates daguerreotypes almost every day with Auguste Mestral, according to the recollections of eyewitnesses. It was during these sessions that occurs the famous incidental finding of the qualities of beeswax, leading with the advice of the scientist Victor Regnault to the waxed paper process. The Gray, excited by the possible acceleration of exposure, developed the process with his friends. Several portraits are preserved, the oldest, dated Saturday, June 10, 1848 represents Le Secq on a balcony.

… On May 19, 1838, the two brothers repurchased with their parents the assets of Giroux et Cie of which they became sole owner. Alphonse-Gustave headed the commercial endeavors, while André simply played the part of silent partner. The following year, in the weeks that followed the advertisement of the discovery of photography, Jacques Louis Mandé Daguerre, the inventor, signed on June 22, 1839 a franchise agreement with “Giroux and Co” for the construction and marketing of his photographic systems, including cameras, plates, chemicals and ancillary equipment…